> kpsewhich --expand-var '$TEXMFCNF'
> /opt/local/TeX/texmf-var/web2c:{/opt/local/TeX/bin/sparc-solaris2.7,/opt/local/TeX/bin,/opt/local/TeX}{,{/share,}/texmf{.local,}/web2c}
This information is useless. The search path for the texmf.cnf file is
not taken from the expansion of the TEXMFCNF variable (which usually is
defined inside a texmf.cnf file). That's a chicken-and-egg problem.
The search path for texmf.cnf is defined at compile-time. Since it
usually is based on some $SELFAUTO stuff, its actual value depends on
the location of the binary. To see the path, run
kpsewhich -show-path=.cnf
Thomas